Research: Healthcare IT 2012 Priorities Survey

Marianne Kolbasuk McGee03/01/12

Healthcare IT 2012 Priorities Survey: Government Mandates Dominate

With healthcare reform, the HITECH Act’s Meaningful Use effort and ICD-10 conversion on IT executives’ minds, many of the health IT priorities in 2012 are similar to those in 2011, according to the 2012 InformationWeek Healthcare IT Priorities survey. In fact, the percentage of respondents who said they are very or somewhat confident in meeting the deadline for Stage 1 is exactly the same as 2011. Still, there are differences: Many healthcare providers already have in place technologies that meet Meaningful Use requirements, while others are planning upgrades or new purchases to get there. The majority with EMR/EHR plans or deployments are confident they will meet the deadline for Stage 2.

As of January, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services reported that 22,937 ­eligible Medicare providers had met Meaningful Use Stage 1 compliance and had been paid nearly $413 million in incentives, while 18,319 eligible Medicaid providers received nearly $385 million in MU incentives.

During that same time period, CMS said 712 Medicare hospitals received nearly $1.29 billion for MU Stage 1 compliance, while 1,285 Medicaid hospitals received almost $1.04 billion.

While many healthcare providers are focused on Meaningful Use efforts, others are weighing whether they’ll participate in new accountable care organizations that are part of the healthcare reform. Digital patient records, health information exchanges and analytics are some of the key technology efforts being pursued by many healthcare providers, especially those that are planning ACO participation.

In February, the Department of Health and Human Services said it would extend the ­October 2013 deadline for medical code conversion from ICD-9 to ICD-10 to an unspecified later date. However, 64% of respondents who ­participated in the January 2012 InformationWeek Healthcare IT Priorities survey placed meeting that and other regulatory compliance deadlines as a top priority for this year.

While government programs and mandates are clearly driving the order of IT priorities for many healthcare organizations, providers are also focused on other goals, including improving care, collaboration among clinicians and process efficiencies.

Among healthcare providers, the use of mobile computing is getting hotter, interest in cloud computing is still lukewarm and concern about security appears less intense than one might expect. (R4290312)

Survey Name: InformationWeek 2012 Healthcare IT Priorities Survey

Survey Date: January 2012

Region: North America

Number of Respondents: 476; 337 working at a doctors’ practice, hospital, healthcare center or other healthcare provider

Purpose: To determine examine technology trends and strategies within the healthcare sector.

Methodology: InformationWeek surveyed North American business technology decision-makers within the healthcare sector, including doctors’ practices, hospitals, healthcare centers, healthcare insurers and payers, and pharmaceutical and life sciences companies. The survey was conducted online, and respondents were recruited via an email invitation containing an embedded link to the survey. The email invitation was sent to qualified InformationWeek and InformationWeek Healthcare subscribers. This report ­focuses on technology trends and strategies among healthcare providers.